Modern Britain

Gallery: Churches of Kent

by Peter Kessler, 30 August 2009. Updated 13
December 2012

St Andrew's Presbyterian Church lay on Wincheap
Green, on the corner of Station Road East and Pin Hill, overlooking
the Wincheap Roundabout. The Presbyterians broke away from Guildhall
Street Congregational Church in 1875, and in 1880-1881 they erected
this later Early English style church on the green. The Presbyterians
merged with St Andrew's Watling Street (below) in 1973 and the church
was demolished to make way for a project that was never begun.

The site of St Mary de Castro Church is
thought to be where the White Hart public house now stands, at
Worthington Place on Castle Row. The former churchyard behind and to
its left is now Mary de Castro public park, which has a brick wall
lined with tombstones. The church was demolished in 1486 and its
parish merged with St Mildred's, although it was not the earliest victim
of parish rationalisation in Canterbury. Little detail survives
regarding the church building.

St John the Baptist's Church, also known
as St John the Poor due to its slender income, stood at the
southern end of St John's Lane, in what is now the western part of
Watling Street car park. It was built in 746 by Archbishop Cuthbert,
but it declined and in 1349 was united to St Mary de Castro. The remains
were used as a malt house and tenements until demolition in 1520. The
burial ground was leased in 1538, with the altar stone, paving tiles
and steeple timber sold off.

St Margaret's Church is on the street of
the same name. The main building was a fourteenth and fifteenth
century rebuild of an earlier Norman church, although the original
west door survives. Drastic restoration work was undertaken in 1850,
when a stair turret was added to the tower, but the 1942 bombing
severely damaged the church. It was adapted as a chapel in 1957,
declared redundant in 1990, and converted for the Canterbury Tales
visitor attraction.

St Mary Bredman, on the High Street almost
opposite Mercery Lane, was built before 1160. Probably a Norman church,
the name 'Bredman' reveals its connection to the bread market which was
next to it. Rebuilt in 1828, the church was demolished in 1900 and a
small public space created with a Crimean War memorial at its centre.
The church's name is now spelt 'Breadman' on the plaque on the wall
there. The churchyard lies underneath Nason's department store.

St Andrew (Old Church) stood at The Parade
(formerly Middle Row), on the High Street. When the old church was
built is unknown, but it was probably Norman, if not Saxon. It had
one isle, one chancel, and a west spire steeple. It stood in the
middle of the street, with a narrow lane on each side of it for the
thoroughfare. The west door was at the crossing between Mercery Lane
and St Margaret's Street. By 1679, the town watch used this door as
a stand for one of their units.

In 1754, Archbishop Abbott's water conduit, behind
the church to the east, opposite Angel (Butchery Lane) was removed. The
church itself (at the bottom of this reconstruction) was taken down in
1763 and fully rebuilt in modern red brick, set in a small recess on the
west side of the street, with two aisles, chancel, and square tower.
Opened in 1773, it finally closed in the 1880s, and was demolished in 1956.
The site of the Renaissance-style entrance is now a cash point.

St Mary Bredin (Old) Church was
on the north side of Rose Lane (now under Bhs). The Norman flint church
was built by William Fitz-Hamon, William the Conqueror's man. It had a
turret, spire and three bells. Known as Little Lady Dungeon Church,
from its smallness and proximity to the dungeon, it was rebuilt to a far
grander scale in 1867 with a tall spire (added 1881). It was destroyed
during the Baedaker raids of 1942, and St Mary Bredin (New) Church replaced
it.

St Andrew's United Reformed Church is on the
corner of Watling Street and Marlowe Avenue. A Countess of Huntingdon
chapel was built on the opposite side of Watling Street in 1863 and
vied with Guildhall Street Church for members. As Watling Street
Congregational Church, a new building was erected on the site in
1953. St Andrew's Presbyterian Church merged with it in 1972, and the
Whitefriars redevelopment saw the old building demolished in favour of
this one.

St Edmund of Ridingate (Rider's Gate) was officially
known as St Edmund King & Martyr. It was located on the southern
carriageway of the Roman gate (on the left of this photo showing the entrance
to Watling Street), close to the city walls. It was another of William Fitz-Hamon's
churches, but was closed in 1349 after the Black Death depopulation, one of the
earliest to be made redundant. It and the gate were completely removed in 1782,
so that no trace survives.

Additional information and one photo on this page
provided by Tricia Baxter.